Bonecruncher Soccer

There's one inescapable fact about football: it's constantly changing.

Even if you put aside all the money that's flooded into the sport – or in the case of some teams, the total lack of it – it's a different beast from the game of 30 or 40 years ago.

Most notable, however, has been the slow and steady death of dribbling. With pass and move now the byline of many clubs beyond Merseyside, players who have the ability to engage in a mazy run or two are rare.

It's interesting, therefore, that Distinctive Developments has decided to serve up a game that is about nothing more than that lost art of dribbling.

Rather than serving up another soccer sim, this is a title that focuses on one specific element. Indeed, it's possible to mistake Bonecruncher Soccer for something of a mini-game.

The simple task at hand is to score a goal. Rather than controlling an entire team, you take to the pitch with just one man. You're given five attempts, after which the game ends and your score is totted up before you're dumped back to the main menu, arcade style.

With the view dropped in behind your player and the accelerometer handling movement, you run towards the goal, avoiding a series the tackles that come from all corners of the pitch.

To get past each player, for instance, you have to perform a trick – a sidestep, a spin – activated by simple swipes on the screen. Pulling off the moves themselves is not difficult, but timing it so the player doesn't get to you first is a little trickier.

That's because, even if you don't lose the ball, the run ends if the opposing player makes any kind of contact with you whatsoever.

Fouling you is pretty much the only way your opponent can stop you en route to goal. However nasty and - thanks to the game's sound effects - bone-crunching these tackles might be, they're enough to bring your attempt to score to an end.

While such knocks out are rare early in the game, actually scoring once you get into the box can be decidedly tricky.

Here, play slows right down, with various targets on the goal offering more points than others. Shooting requires nothing more than a screen swipe, but learning not to blast the ball over in haste or failing to put enough power behind your shot takes practice.

With four different levels of difficulty to play through – each one adding new elements, such as cones to dribble through along the way – there's certainly chance enough to learn what shots work and what shot don't.

There's also plenty of reason to keep on playing even once the job is supposedly done, with more points for pulling off flashier moves or hitting targets in the goal.

Of course, such is the relatively narrow focus of Bonecruncher Soccer that it's fair to say it's not the most expansive package. Instead of springing surprise challenges on you, it essentially shifts gears up gently, keeping you on board the whole time rather than throwing you off track.

As such, Bonecruncher Soccer is a game holding out for the long haul, delivering a succession of short but sweet tricks.